Although the European People's Party, the largest group in the Parliament, largely pushed for the legislation on the end of roaming charges to take effect, its ICT unit announced in an email seen by POLITICO that these charges would continue to apply to those who use a SIM card provided by the group “until end of this month.”

The EPP email said the center-right group would only add the “10 Gb data plan per month for every sim card” on August 1.

“This means that during July we will still be charged per [megabyte],” the email said. “If you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact us.”

The email caused uproar among many EPP staffers who didn’t understand how the European Parliament could rubberstamp the end of roaming charges in Europe but not apply it internally.

Many members and staffers in the EPP group, who regularly travel around Europe and extensively use Whatsapp to communicate, signed up to a corporate contract with Proximus, the largest of Belgium's three mobile telecommunications companies.

The European Parliament has been one of the champions of getting rid of roaming surcharges.

Complaints from MEPs about their constituents' shock mobile bills in 2004 compelled Viviane Reding, the commissioner for information society and media at the time, to address roaming surcharges, she told POLITICO.

Earlier this year, MEPs approved the downscaling of wholesale mobile roaming rates, which are the prices telecoms providers charge each other when their customers travel abroad. That was considered one of the last steps to eliminating roaming surcharges.

The European Commission insisted that this did not affect them: It has been benefiting from a "roam like at home" service for over two months.

The European Parliament supported the move to eliminate roaming charges, a move that would “end another barrier to the free circulation” in Europe and show “the European Union’s added value,” said EPP MEP Pilar del Castillo Vera, who negotiated the deal on behalf of her group.

“We now need to concentrate our efforts on making Europe a Gigabit Society,” she added.